shapes of happiness
It's been a weird week: Soren's had problems with his leg and other parts, Jane's dealing with kidney stones again, and Skippy's got an ingrown claw. I'm physically fine, emotionally a bit more labile than I would like, but making plans and following through.
Yesterday, we were all up in the morning, having coffee and breakfast, then I got industrious and made a batch of chili. It would be better if I'd gotten some fresh jalapenos or serranos, and perhaps even one habanero (I like their bright flavor more than jalapenos), but it was good, and will be even better once it's melded more. (Standard improvised recipe, though with medium hot chili powder from Penzey's, unsweetened baking chocolate, and four times as many kidney and garbanzo beans as black beans -- I like black beans, but they tend to overwhelm other flavors -- plus ground and diced beef, tomatoes, onions, garlic. Nothing special. I should look for recipes with tomatillos and pork.)
(Wonder if a dash of apple cider vinegar would brighten the taste.)
At any rate, Soren was a bit too tired to stay up and watch movies, but we had dinner together (salad made by Jane, rice, and cornbread, as well), talked, had tiny glasses of the fortified blueberry and black currant wines we like, and then wandered off to our respective spaces. A good quiet day.
We've been making happy discoveries together lately. The local branch of the library is not great for serendipitous book discoveries (it's very small), but does have an interesting CD selection: we found three Spearhead albums Soren doesn't have, and a Robyn Hitchcock album we'd not heard. And we passed eleven dogs (all of different breeds, I should note, though not the Tibetan Mastiffs) on the way home from the library -- we must have gone out at peak dog-walking time. Daffodils are coming up, the miniature ones first, and now the larger ones, and there are two different types of trees with pink-to-fuchsia blossoms (dense, multi-petaled, like roses) fiercely defiant of the cold.
I give little snippets of what I/we see and do, and sometimes wonder if I sound excessively perky and repetitive -- but it's good. The three of us fit well together, and I really do enjoy living out here. This weekend, Soren's going to a volleyball game for one of his nieces, then to hang with an old friend, while I head down to Burien to see The Who's Tommy; we're planning a Costco expedition with his parents, and Jane is going to plant some cherry tomato plants for me. We are a quietly happy household.
Yesterday, we were all up in the morning, having coffee and breakfast, then I got industrious and made a batch of chili. It would be better if I'd gotten some fresh jalapenos or serranos, and perhaps even one habanero (I like their bright flavor more than jalapenos), but it was good, and will be even better once it's melded more. (Standard improvised recipe, though with medium hot chili powder from Penzey's, unsweetened baking chocolate, and four times as many kidney and garbanzo beans as black beans -- I like black beans, but they tend to overwhelm other flavors -- plus ground and diced beef, tomatoes, onions, garlic. Nothing special. I should look for recipes with tomatillos and pork.)
(Wonder if a dash of apple cider vinegar would brighten the taste.)
At any rate, Soren was a bit too tired to stay up and watch movies, but we had dinner together (salad made by Jane, rice, and cornbread, as well), talked, had tiny glasses of the fortified blueberry and black currant wines we like, and then wandered off to our respective spaces. A good quiet day.
We've been making happy discoveries together lately. The local branch of the library is not great for serendipitous book discoveries (it's very small), but does have an interesting CD selection: we found three Spearhead albums Soren doesn't have, and a Robyn Hitchcock album we'd not heard. And we passed eleven dogs (all of different breeds, I should note, though not the Tibetan Mastiffs) on the way home from the library -- we must have gone out at peak dog-walking time. Daffodils are coming up, the miniature ones first, and now the larger ones, and there are two different types of trees with pink-to-fuchsia blossoms (dense, multi-petaled, like roses) fiercely defiant of the cold.
I give little snippets of what I/we see and do, and sometimes wonder if I sound excessively perky and repetitive -- but it's good. The three of us fit well together, and I really do enjoy living out here. This weekend, Soren's going to a volleyball game for one of his nieces, then to hang with an old friend, while I head down to Burien to see The Who's Tommy; we're planning a Costco expedition with his parents, and Jane is going to plant some cherry tomato plants for me. We are a quietly happy household.